From Aalborg to Austin: Google Partner MapsPeople boosts international growth with DKK 15 million from The Danish Growth Fund

Malou Damgaard
|
December
21,
2017

The fast-growing IT company, MapsPeople, has reached an agreement with The Danish Growth Fund about a capital injection on DKK 15 million. The company, which has offices in Northern Jutland and Copenhagen, has grown 255% over the past three years and employed 20 new employees in the same periode. With the additional capital, MapsPeople now prepares to expand into the American market.

Expansion in the United States

The core product, MapsIndoors, is an indoor navigation solution that has already gained foothold in several American companies; Most recently Kohl’s, Gartner and Google. With the investment from The Danish Growth Fund in place, it’s now possible to really enter the American market.

“We’ll establish an office in Austin and start setting our American team. We believe in a physical presence and a concentrated effort now that we’re really about to enter that part of the market”, says MapsPeople CCO, Jonas Berntsen, who together with his family will move to Austin in the summer of 2018 to take control of this important step in the company’s development himself.

Getting capital through The Danish Growth Fund to support the growth plans has given renewed energy and increased faith in the vision of being the company behind the World’s best indoor navigation solution. Besides entering new markets, MapsPeople will also focus on the development of the product in order to stay the best and create the future tendencies.

The market for indoor navigation is growing rapidly, and at MapsPeople they’re happy about the positive development.

“The agreement with The Danish Growth Fund allows us to get the best and most competent feedback, to boosts our plans, to take a piece of the US market for indoor navigation, and at the same time develop the future generations of our core product. We expect a lot of 2018”, says MapsPeople CEO, Michael Gram.

Investment from The Danish Growth Fund

The capital for MapsPeople’s further development is a combination of equity investment from The Danish Growth Fund and loan finance from Nordjyske Bank and The Danish Growth Fund. Lars Rønn, partner in the department of direct investments, VF Venture, is looking forward for the investment to accelerate MapsPeople’s international expansion.

“MapsPeople has discovered an obvious business opportunity and developed a unique technology to a market that’ll grow in the coming years. Indoor navigation has a great potential, and the company has already shown an impressive growth. As certified Google Partner, MapsPeople is well-equipped to really take a part of the US market, and the first deals show that both the interest and the need are there”, says Lars Rønn.

About The Danish Growth Fund

The Danish Growth Fund is the Danish state’s investment fund that contributes to creating more growth companies by providing capital and expertise. Since 1992, The Danish Growth Fund has together with private investors co-financed growth in more than 6,600 Danish companies with a total commitment of more than DKK 20 billion. The Danish Growth Fund invests equity in partnership with private investors and finances with loans and guarantees in cooperation with Danish financial institutions.The Danish Growth Fund’s direct investment department, VF Venture, invests annually in approx. 10 companies. Learn more at www.vf.dk.

The Danish newspaper Børsen also did an article about The Danish Growth Fund and MapsPeople.